Lib Dems unveil youth crime plan

Under the Liberal Democrats' new youth crime strategy, children who admit their guilt would be sent before panels of local people to apologise, with punishment in the form of a positive behaviour order and work such as cleaning up graffiti.

Speaking to youngsters at Castlehaven Community Association in Camden, north London, Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said children who are taken into custody are 75% more likely to re-offend and "it is usually an offence that is worse than the first one".

He said: "As soon as you put a kid into custody they are picking up all sorts of tricks that you actually don't want them to pick up.

"At the moment we are spending 11 times as much locking up kids as we are on this sort of project. We lock up more kids than any other country in Europe. The government has criminalised a whole generation of young people."

The proposals also include the formation of a new Youth Volunteer Force to carry out community projects and tougher penalties for shops which sell alcohol to children.

The party also called for a greater use of restorative justice programmes, so offenders could be forced to meet victims and see the consequences of their crimes.

Castlehaven offers programmes for children up to the age of 19 including one for youths who have been identified as being at risk from crime, anti-social behaviour and social exclusion.

Mr Huhne said: "This is a particularly good example of how kids could be caught at an early age when police or social workers feel they are at risk of going off the rails.

"Castlehaven is a good example of the kind of project that we would like to see across the whole country."